How did you break the night bottle habit with your child?

[reveriereptile]

My son just turned 1 year old yesterday and he still has a night bottle habit. He will usually do good till 3am when he wakes up for a bottle. After that it is random if he wakes up. He has also been sitting up in his sleep often and I have to run over to lay him back down before he just lets himself drop onto the crib bars.He doesn't need a bottle to go to sleep as long as he has had something to eat within the hour before.

So far I've tried picking him up to sooth him back to sleep, nighttime music, offering water, and watering down the formula. None of it seems to have worked. He will wake completely up if I put water in his mouth. He hates water for some reason. If I do get him back to sleep he wakes up 10 minutes later and will keep waking up often. With the watered down formula he wakes up more often during the night for more bottles.

He use to sleep most of the night without any problems. There were 3 months that I would only have to get up once or twice and it was either for a bottle or diaper change. Ever since he started rolling over to sleep on his tummy or should I say fetal position on his legs has he been waking up more. I wasn't sure if his legs were falling asleep with him laying like that. His knees are usually red. He was getting stuck at rolling back over but he learned what to do. He started sitting up in his sleep after this. The problem with that is he lets himself drop back down and he has hit his head on the crib before and it woke him up crying.

We were having a diaper size problem and I finally had to order size 7 diapers. Yup, that is right a size 7 for a 1 year old. He is very tall and stocky for his age. His upper legs are so big around like his dad's that I have to buy bigger to have more waist adjustment to make the leg holes bigger. He was leaking often with the other diapers at night. I think the size and fit weren't working anymore with the size 6 due to the way he sleeps. It would soak up the front and leak out the top.

If anyone has any suggestions I'd appreciate it. I need to break this habit mainly due to his teeth. I don't have good teeth and I don't know if it passed down to him or not. I don't like the formula sitting on them all night.

 

[Punkstermom]

My oldest daughter was like that to until about a year and a half. And I too was worried about the formula on her teeth as well as pooling in her ear canals and causing ear infections. So for the sake of our sanity and sleep I just started giving her night bottles full of water only. She got mad once and I mean M...A...D! LOL so other than waiting out the first night of anger she figured out we weren't giving her anything else. So the water obviously wouldn't hurt her teeth and if anything kept them nice and rinsed off haha. And didn't have as many concerns about ear infections and since it was only water she eventually quit caring about night bottle because well.... It was just water..how fun is that? I told her dr what we were doing when they asked about night bottles and he said well ...it's only water...can't hurt her and keeps her hydrated too. So yay! The only thing you will have to deal with then is flooded diapers from water haha!

 

[reveriereptile]

He hates water at any time. He won't drink it during the day either.

We are now having the problem of him not liking cow's milk. He gets acid real bad from it. His dad and grandfather doesn't digest cow's milk well. He will drink it if it has chocolate in it so it isn't the texture. I did buy some vanilla soy milk and he likes it once it is room temperature.

He has his year check up and shot on Monday so I might have to talk to his Ped about stuff. I don't really care for her. He is tongue tied and she kept putting it off saying that he isn't having a problem eating to not to worry about it. I'm wondering if it is why I couldn't nurse. We kept pushing it and once he got on table food he was still having problems. She kept trying to say he was to young to eat chunky food yet. This was when he was 9-10 months old and had strong interests in table foods and could move his mouth well for chewing. Then now with being a year old he still has problems if he is teething. He can't chew on his back gums cause his tongue won't reach back there and if he is teething then his gums are to sore on the front sides so he cuts solids almost completely out. Cause she wouldn't do anything about it when he was younger I found out that now he will need to be put under to do it. If I would have known that and that she herself didn't do the procedure we would have found another doctor then. We may still get another Ped once we get his new insurance set up.

 

[Punkstermom]

Ya my BIL had that. They cut his piece of skin under the tongue back when he had trouble even with a bottle. So ya I'm sure it probably did interfere with nursing :/ I know sometimes they do wait for it to recede on its own but they seem to do it if it's causing feeding problems though..hmmm ya I would ask another ped if it was me . Cause ya I even had my oldest daughter eating baby food from 3 months due to acid reflux. And my other 2 were eating like mad by 6 months. That needs checked into for sure before you tackle the bottle issue because if that's where he's getting his main calories then you will want him to be able to eat properly. And as for water he may throw a fit but he will need to get use to it. Water is very good to flush toxins and flush the kidneys out properly. I guess like with my oldest you give them a bottle of water and if they don't like it what are they gonna do? They can't get it themselves yet... So they will either drink it or give up the night bottle. That's when mine gave hers up. When she figured out we weren't giving in we started finding a full bottle of water in her crib in the morning lol it's a bit funny because she's still my one that tries getting her way too

 

[Punkstermom]

And aside from soy milk you may try goat milk too. A lot of ppl who can't do cows milk can do goat fine. We are actually talking about getting some dairy goats ourselves. I'm not totally read up on it yet but I know they have smaller proteins and agree with our digestive track better. And if you find a local way to buy it that could help avoid GMOs that soy milk may present as well. I know a lot of research is going into finding how all the Genetically modified foods are actually causing these digestive problems to begin with.

 

[reveriereptile]

I may force the water bottle at night. I might start with the bottles after the first and work back from there. He seems like he is actually hungry for the first bottle. He will be sucking in his sleep before he wakes up for it.

He had acid also and is still on the Enfamil AR formula. We just never switched off cause he didn't completely get rid of all his acid till around 9 months and he still wants to eat every couple of hours. I was afraid he would want to eat more without the rice starch since it might be less filling.

I'm thinking of buying the toddler formula even though I know they are a waste of money but cheaper than the other formula. Till I get him switched off the formula and eating better solids I don't want to take all the formula away so he doesn't end up lacking in something. He LOVES fruits. I had to start feeding that last during his meals cause he would only eat it. He doesn't mind veggies. He won't touch the pureed veggies but once he got the table ones he likes them. He isn't wanting to eat meat lately cause of his teeth and doesn't like beans or eggs. Don't know how to get him more protein. He never has liked oatmeal either. I tried that so many ways and times but he spits it out right off.

 

[cafarmgirl]

My two are teenagers now but I do remember the nighttime bottle issue! We did the bottle of water at night as well, worked like a charm. They weren't thrilled with it at first, but, well...to bad lol! I didn't want them taking juice or formula to bed all night with them and ruining their teeth so water it was. I would leave it next to them, wedged between the crib bars and they would get it if they woke up in the night or very early in the morning. It wasn't long until they weren't bothering with it at all and would just go back to sleep on their own if they did wake up.

 

[Punkstermom]

Oh my gosh I am just loving reading this. Everything is just like my oldest haha. Ya we had her on AR as well. I never did do a toddler formula. We added baby food because even with AR she could still projectile vomit. She didn't grow out of it until about a year and a half. The vomiting that is. She is 9 now and still does get acid reflux but is old enough to chew Roland's or tums now. And mostly her triggers are fried foods or chocolate. Pop also does it but I hardly ever let her have pop anyways. Anyhow ya she wouldn't touch most meat baby foods including spaghetti and things like that. But...! I got her to eat meat with fruits and veggies try turkey and sweet potatoes or turkey with applesauce or chicken with blueberries etc. the turkey or chicken is such a easy flavor to mix with veggies or fruits they already like since turkey and chicken have such a mild flavor. Yet they still are a great protein! And FYI by my 3rd baby I just bought a ninja ( the cheap one like 30 some bucks) and puréed most of whatever I wanted to feed her myself. But either way I didn't feel that ambitious with my first 2 though so whatever works for you. Also if he's doing finger foods yet I bought the "O" shaped pasta a can of mixed veggies (no salt added) and a can of low sodium cream of chicken soup. Boil pasta, drain veggies and stir all together when it's done. It's just like the gerber toddler meals but cheaper and healthier I'm sure with less preservatives

 

[reveriereptile]

I have a very lazy son that still rarely holds his own bottle or sippy cup. He won't tip the cup up to get anything out of it.

Once it gets nicer outside we are going to start grilling more often. I think that will help increase his meat intake. We have some marinated chicken we are going to put into the slow cooker. He usually likes that. I may get some hamburger or turkey burger and cook it to put into some spaghetti next time I fix some. He loves spaghetti.

We tried taco's with him but didn't give him the shell just the ingredients in it. It was a mild seasoning. He wouldn't hardly touch it. He normally would eat some but his mouth was hurting him so bad the last few days that he has been biting us.

 

[Punkstermom]

Awwww poor baby ya I would for sure get another opinion or two and in the mean time try giving him frozen wash rags or frozen bananas to chew on..